Alice wasn’t unaware of this woman’s plans. Some of what she had said to Kathy made her want to throttle her. Kathy had needed her though. Alice wasn’t qualified to help in that area and to see the progress, while slow, she was happy to see her smiling with the children. Their own relationship needed a lot of work though and for this she was sad. The careful little notes the doctor had kept on her own private laptop though would be viciously attacked by a ‘worm virus’ the moment Alice decided it was ‘time.’ Alice wanted no personal opinions or covert little bits of data leaving the island. The woman, while competent, had a right to her personal opinion but not at the cost of Alice or Kathy’s privacy. She wanted no ‘accurate’ record of the woman’s time on the island or her intimate knowledge of things Kathy had shared. Without a written record she would have to rely on her memory which could be argued as being faulty.
“Maybe if she spent some time now back in the States in familiar surroundings it would help,” the doctor tried again.
Alice knew she was attempting to get Kathy back to Los Angeles and treat her there but the doctor was leaving next week, alone…and alive. There was no way that Kathy would be seeing this doctor again after she left. Her power over Kathy’s mind was at an end, she had done a lot for her but no more. She had been paid a lot of money and in the end she had crossed a line that Alice would not accept. “Those familiar surroundings caused her a lot of anxiety before. That’s why you suggested a trip. Look how she’s blossomed since we’ve been here.” Kathy did look healthy, physically. Her mind however could have her quivering in minutes. Loud noises still sent her cowering as though she were to be punished. A romance movie on the satellite television made her feel uncomfortable. She could watch comedies with the children as long as there was no violence. She had finally started helping them with their schoolwork to keep up with their classes back home. It was all sent to them via the internet and they were doing very well and now with Kathy’s help they were smiling more and exceeding expectations. Recently Kathy had let them hug her and accepted their innocent affections for what they were. Her days of remaining frozen when they tried to touch her were over. Now only Alice caused her to feel that and recently even that seemed to be waning.
“Yes she has done very well in these surroundings. It’s paradise. Someday though she will have to go back to the real world and face common everyday things.”
Alice shrugged, if Kathy needed to stay here the rest of her life then that was fine with her. They had the children and each other, they had enough money to last them for a lifetime, several lifetimes, and if this was what Kathy needed, to be isolated, she didn’t mind.
“I’d like to take Kathy with me when I leave next week?” the doctor felt brave enough to ask with Alice’s silence.
Alice turned again and fixed her yellow eyes that seemed suddenly orange and bright on the doctor, “My wife would never leave her children,” she stated matter of factly.
“Perhaps they could go with her?” the doctor ventured, not mentioning Alice at all.
“We are a family, we will stay together,” Alice warned and hoped the doctor heeded it; her patience for this exasperating doctor was wearing thin.
Dr. Lambert swallowed, something about the look warned her to be quiet but her own sensibilities were trying to override that and get her to get her patient out of this unhealthy lifestyle.
Alice held up her hand, “Doctor, let’s not quibble over it, you are leaving next week and my family and I are staying here in our vacation home indefinitely. I would appreciate you continuing your therapy with my wife but I don’t want you talking to her about her or my children leaving here again.”
Dr. Lambert opened her mouth to argue but then realized that she too was at the mercy of this woman, she had to rely on her to get back to ‘civilization’ and she wasn’t certain where in the world they were exactly. Alice had her sign a non-disclosure agreement before coming here and the two different planes they had ridden in gave her no clue of where they were precisely. She had guessed they were in the Caribbean but really, she didn’t know and as she didn’t speak Spanish or Portuguese she hadn’t been able to ask the help. She nodded before looking back out at her patient playing in the surf with her children. She saw out of the corner of her eye as Alice walked away and strangely felt immense relief.
I’m broken. I’ve never felt like this and hope to never again. The endless questions have me wanting to pull out my hair. They ask the same questions five different ways. Don’t they hear me the first time? I know they want to trip me up. I know they think I’m lying. I know they hope I’ll reveal more than what I’ve told them. They don’t know. They have no flippin’ clue of what it’s been like.
Kathy knew these conversations were in her own mind but she had been in her own mind for a long time. It had been her only friend for a very long time and she didn’t trust anything or anyone else, not now, not yet, maybe never again. Her mind was the only place she felt safe for a very long time, they had used her body, they had beaten and abused it. They had controlled her mind to varying degrees but deep down they had never penetrated her inner shield. It was that shield that kept her from trusting again, certain there was something out there trying to get her. Slowly, so slowly it was infinitesimal, she was learning to trust again. The children were a major step. They loved unconditionally. She had been afraid for so long in the various hospitals and the unrelenting questions that were thrown at her. Coming home had been equally fearful. The children though, they had accepted her joyously and unreservedly, without the invasive questions that adults asked, without expecting anything but love in return.
Alice had been acting odd for a long time as well. Kathy was subliminally aware of it but it helped when her best friend Bonnie had asked innocent questions that got her thinking. Where was Alice all the time? Where did she go on her business trips? Not all of it was business? When Kathy began to question it too, it began to wear on her psyche. She began to wonder if Alice was cheating on her. Alice was a beautiful and vibrant woman. She began to wonder if there were others. Alice was still attentive. Their love life was okay, not as passionate as when they first got together but still good after two children together and many years. Kathy thought it was because she had gained some weight having the children and she wasn’t as desirable. Then she thought it was because Alice had seen her giving birth, that always changed a relationship according to Bonnie. Bonnie really understood her, she was her best friend next to Alice but then a lot of people didn’t understand her relationship with Alice. How could she be in love with a woman who was so outwardly cold? Bonnie asked her periodically about it, she didn’t get how someone like Kathy was with someone like Alice. She asked about her business, she wondered why Alice was absent from school functions. When Kathy too began to wonder the insecurities began to erode at their relationship.
One night Kathy followed Alice across town to a house that Alice was obviously familiar with as she drove her Porsche into the garage and went into the house where she stayed a couple of hours before leaving. Kathy followed her a couple of times to find her there. It alarmed her because she saw no one else until one day when a Hispanic man cut the lawn and a woman went inside. Kathy realized she didn’t know for sure but everything told her that this was a house that Alice was trysting in! Bonnie sympathized with her and told her she should confront Alice! Kathy wrote her a letter:
Dear Alice,
I followed you to this address. I don’t know what you do here but I am deeply hurt
that you would not tell me about this. I don’t know what to think about this. I know
you don’t tell me all about your business deals and properties and I haven’t cared in
the past but this hurts. This really hurts. Now you know that I know and maybe you
could find it in your heart to tell me what this house is to you and why you come here.
Kathy (see the book: Mourning Malice)
She dropped the letter into the mail s
lot of the house she had watched Alice disappear into a couple of times a week and then waited to hear from her.
She thought that Alice hadn’t read it yet and then when she got a romantic letter from Alice suggesting that they meet at the condo for a picnic on the boat she was thrilled, perhaps Alice was going to ‘confess’ and they could get past this impasse. She hadn’t felt very loving towards her wife in a while and she wanted to patch things up. She’d kept her key to the condo and felt confident as she unlocked the door, disarmed the alarm, and went into the garage to put the door up and pull her Volvo inside. She thought about leaving it up for Alice but closed it anyway out of habit as she went in to wait. Why did Alice keep this place, they hadn’t lived here in years and it was pretty expensive to keep just for the boat! She didn’t hear the man that came up behind her until movement caught the corner of her eye. The arm wrapped around her suddenly and the shot into her neck silenced her almost immediately. His near stranglehold on her kept her quiet and from struggling. She fought whatever he injected in her neck but she soon blacked out.
Kathy briefly came to in what she believed was an ambulance as they nearly dropped her off the gurney when they moved her from the ambulance to a waiting car. She could see blood everywhere and they wrapped her in a blanket before she passed out again. Time had no meaning to her and she had no idea where she was but it felt like she traveled a lot and for a long period of time. She was hot in the blanket but her hands were zip tied behind her and her ankles as well. Her mouth was taped with what she believed was duct tape and she was able to get that to peel back as it didn’t do well when wet but that soon passed as she became dehydrated. She was in and out of consciousness for a long period of time. She awoke to find herself in what would become her ‘cell’ for an indefinite period of time.
“Hello Kathy,” a man’s voice said to her with a soothing quality to it. “Come on my pet, it’s time for you to awaken and learn your fate.”
Kathy didn’t want to awaken. She felt warm and dry and the lights hurt her eyes. The drugs they had used often caused a painful reaction in the retina of their victim’s eyes. She blinked painfully as she fought waking up and yet she wanted to know where she was, where was Alice, was she in an accident and in a hospital of some sort? She didn’t remember driving anywhere.
Kathy pulled herself from her reverie to answer one of the children. The memories were painful. The experience was painful. She didn’t want to remember but she also didn’t want to forget. Dr. Lambert told her, it wasn’t a matter of forgetting or letting it go, it was a matter of coping with it better. She breathed a deep sigh as she watched the children play in the surf with their dog. Who would have thought? Alice allowing the kids a dog? She shook her head. Alice had changed a lot since she had met her. She looked around the beach she was sitting on, enjoying the sun’s rays that were burning her skin even darker. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Alice come down to the beach and adorn her snorkeling gear, she did this frequently and it wasn’t out of the ordinary. She liked to look out on the reef at the various fish; occasionally she used a spear gun and kept a knife strapped to her leg for protection. Kathy couldn’t help but notice the bikini that Alice wore, admiring the curves that it enhanced. Although she had told Dr. Lambert that they hadn’t been intimate it didn’t stop her from wanting to be with Alice but she had no idea how to initiate it after all this time. What if Alice didn’t want her anymore? After all the men that had had her she might be disgusted at the thought. Alice didn’t know the full story and Kathy wasn’t sure she would ever want her to.
Alice swam out to the reef enjoying the challenge of pulling against the waves that made it into their little lagoon before looking out over her private domain and then below its surface. She loved looking at the little community that lived in the lagoon. She was aware that Kathy had been watching her, her peripheral vision had told her she was being watched as well as intuition and perhaps a sixth sense. Kathy frequently watched her when she thought she wasn’t aware of it but Alice was aware, very aware of her wife. She slept next to her nightly and was cognizant that she spent hours watching a supposedly sleeping Alice. Only her superb mind control allowed her to pretend to be asleep as Kathy watched her and lost herself in thought. Alice was aware of how much she wanted Kathy, she also had suspicions that Kathy wanted her as well but she had no idea how to initiate lovemaking with her wife at this point after all this time.
Looking at the endlessly fascinating marine life that lived on the reef, Alice looked for a particular fish that was becoming scarce after months of hunting it. Alice spotted one after half an hour of hunting but it was a small one and she let it go to grow to adulthood. She wanted a fully adult fish, one in its prime and spotting it a while later when she had about given up she shot it with impunity and quickly went to a section of the reef where she could remove part of the fish and then throw the rest into the oncoming waves feeding the multitude of fish that lived on a reef, nothing would be wasted. She slipped something into the end of her knife where a cap unscrewed before slipping the knife back into the leg holster where it resided. She looked back at the beach to see that Kathy and the children were still playing on the beach, Kathy playing Frisbee with the dog running into the waves and with the children giving chase to the dog. She smiled at the sight. It looked so normal. She sighed wondering what normal was anymore?
They all waved as the plane taking Dr. Lambert away pulled away from the dock and using the smoother water of the lagoon quickly gained speed to take off from the water. Alice was the first to turn away and the children followed her back to the waiting Jeep. They waited patiently as Kathy joined them. The children chattered with their mother who was able to maintain a real conversation with them but not a word was spoken between Alice and Kathy and recently the children had become aware of it, particularly Kit who was so much older than her siblings. She alone of the children was aware of the coolness between her two mom’s. It had been understandable that Kathy was distant, Alice had explained she had been held captive in a cliff notes version of the truth but Kit had gleaned that it had been traumatic to her mother. Alice was always cold and distant to a degree but between them it had never been like this and Kit was worried. The longer it went on, the more distant they would become, she didn’t like the idea of her parents possibly divorcing, they were finally a family again and after the previous year she hungered for that.
That night they watched a ‘family’ movie on the satellite, the younger children choosing a cartoon that had recently become popular in the States and then another family style movie. Kit watched her parents who sat next to each other on the couch but kept to their own cushions as though an invisible wall kept them apart. In the past they would have leaned into each other or Kathy would have put her head on Alice’s lap as they all watched something together. The younger children would drape themselves over both mom’s and Kit could be frequently found on the floor in front of them where it was easy for Kathy to reach out and pet her hair. Tonight though the younger kids were draped on Kathy, they didn’t snuggle into Alice who seemed to enjoy the movie but there was something about her that kept her removed. Kit held her arm, they had become closer since Kathy’s disappearance and Alice had looked at her with a smile when she leaned against her during a silly part of the movie and they shared a laugh.
Kathy was surprised at how close Kit and Alice had become. She supposed that was to be expected since she had been gone. She didn’t resent it; she just wondered how to approach Alice. She wanted her; she needed her, and had no clue how to reach her, she couldn’t find the words to breach the wall between them.
“Time for bed,” Alice announced after the popcorn had been eaten and the movie rolled its credits.
“Oh can’t we stay up and watch another movie?” Emily and Sean whined together.
“No, we watched two of your movies, now it’s off to bed,” Alice said firmly and they turned to Kathy who laughed and shook her head.
“Do
n’t look at me, you heard your mother,” she said.
Alice was surprised to hear Kathy refer to her as their mother and the look in Kathy’s eyes gave her some hope.
“Come my chicks, let’s get you washed up for bed,” called Nan who had already seen that the movie was over and was drawing baths for the younger children.
“Would you like to watch another movie?” Alice asked Kathy who nodded and Alice handed her the channel changer as she got up to go out to what had once been a workshop. She quickly rinsed off her snorkeling gear as she had gone out to the reef again that day, salt water erodes certain things quicker than fresh water, or at least that was the excuse she had always given her family when they asked. The fact that it was true was irrelevant. She took from the knife the pouch she had extracted from the fish she frequently hunted and filled several vials which she tucked into a leather pouch and put away in her study when she came back into the house.
Kit and Kathy went to bed after the last movie, three was the limit and the first two had been children’s movies and not as interesting as the comedy that Kathy had chosen. Alice had showered and was in bed pretending to be asleep when Kathy came to bed.
Kathy looked at her a moment before going into the bathroom. She stripped from her customary shorts and tank top to look at herself in the mirror. The bikini top and bottoms she usually wore showed a fairly good body, fully tanned from the tropical sun. The puckering around her stomach from having given birth to three children was fairly tight but still slightly there, it was to be expected. The scars from her experience had physically faded but mentally they were still there. She turned to look to see if the straps of the whip were still visible on her back, these too had faded in time and the sun had colored her skin a nice tan. Mentally though, she still saw them. Dr. Lambert had told they might be there forever but she would learn coping mechanisms and had tried to help teach her them. Kathy wasn’t as unaware of the things Dr. Lambert had done to her under the guise of ‘helping’ her as the good Doctor had thought. The thought of ever leaving Alice had not occurred to her, at least not in the way the Doctor had wanted. She had thought perhaps she was used or shoddy goods and Alice might not want her but Alice gave no sign that she wanted to end their marriage, the initial look in her eye when she had seen her at the hospital told her how much she was relieved to see her, the love was still there. There was something that niggled at Kathy’s consciousness though whenever she thought about that moment and she could never fully grasp it, it bothered her and Dr. Lambert had told her she would remember it when her mind was ready to release it.
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